Shale oil value enhancement research. First quarterly technical progress report, March 1, 1993--May 31, 1993

Concurrent progress is being made in all key areas, namely, separation, characterization and market assessment. The market area, not one of our traditionally strong areas, has been going better than expected. We believe this is due mainly to the emerging interest in new and unconventional materials. The characterization work has been progressing solidly with the fundamental Z-BASIC correlations providing information not heretofore available in the chemical literature. Our agreement with Hewlett-Packard regarding the purchase of equipment at a reduced price is complete and the gc-ms will be ordered shortly. The separation work has progressed satisfactorily although an unexpected amount of time has been required for ``facilities`` and ``equipment`` related issues. Some of these issues have dealt with safety and regulatory compliance when storing larger quantities of samples. These now seem to be solved. We have a lot of direct experience in shale oil separations dating back to the OXY project and before. Also, we will streamline our work by going to prepacked micro-separation tools for some of our separation characterization work. This will allow us to stay on schedule. Overall, we are on schedule with the project. All administration requirements are in place and the accounting and financial records are current